A band of Maori women, slowly chanting in a high, strained key, stood at the gate of a pah, and met with this song a few Englishmen who were driving rapidly on to their land.

Our track lay through a swamp of the New Zealand flax. Huge sword-like leaves and giant flower-stalks all but hid from view the Maori stockades. To the left was a village of low wahrés, fenced round with a double row of lofty posts, carved with rude images of gods and men, and having posterns here and there. On the right were groves of karakas, children of Tanemahuta, the New Zealand sacred trees—under their shade, on a hill, a camp and another and larger pah. In startling contrast to the dense masses of the oily leaves, there stretched a great extent of light-green sward, where there were other camps and a tall flag-staff, from which floated the white flag and the Union Jack, emblems of British sovereignty and peace.

A thousand kilted Maories dotted the green landscape with patches of brilliant tartans and scarlet cloth.